My mum doesn't want me to accidentally breed them so she wants me to get ones of the same gender, and she says parrots often have one gender better at things like talking than others. Not sure about princess parrots, but I would want to breed them in the future and I'm not sure how it would turn out. Mum may have experience with breeding in the past, but not with this species and she's not keen to start breeding again, and I have no experience. If I get, say, 2 males, would it even be possible to introduce 2 females later? If I did so, I think it would be better to do just at the start of breeding season or just before, so they're more accepting of the new arrivals.If I can't introduce later I'll start with a pair of opposite sex birds, and if they breed I can get the help of the bird club since I'll be joined up by then. I haven't had the opportunity to join yet, but they can help me with supplies as well as direct contact with birds and their aviarys and stuff.

My parrot isnt interested in cozy huts so i doubt hed like a coconut. He does however have one of those plastic shelters bottom of his cage. They are used for rabbits or guini pigs... I put things to chewcin there or a light up music ball that he's obsessed with knocking around in there. He does regurgitate on it though.

I have to agree that the huts/hammocks absolutely DO NOT arouse or encourage mating behavior in birds. I have had hammocks in my green cheek's cage for 2 years, he absolutely loves it, and he's never gotten stuck or had any problems at all. My Quaker also got the same hammock when I got him, and he loves his as well. I haven't gotten one for my newer cockatiel yet but I'm going to. When I put the birds to bed they immediately crawl right into their hammocks, lay down on their bellies, and they're out!

I've never seen any mating or nesting behavior in either of my birds that has been related to the hammocks in any way. I put them to bed at sunset and they're up at sunrise, and though I don't think there is any way to completely get rid of hormonal behavior, it certainly is kept to a minimum. Right now my Quaker is being a total ass, but it only lasts about 3 weeks or so (thank God) and then he's back to his sweet heart self. My green cheek gets a bit moody and head Bob's at me a bit, but that's about it. My cockatiel is a 4 month old female, so I have yet to see how she will be, I guess I'll find out this spring. I guess I'm pretty lucky in this respect as I am constantly hearing hormonal nightmare stories. As I said my Quaker is just a jerk and when he first went through this in the spring I was holding my breath that it was not permanent, and it wasn't. But 3 weeks is still too long, Quakers are stubborn to begin with, and when he's hormonal and not getting his way with me his stubbornness escalates to epic proportions. When I tell him no and won't let him ony shoulder or head to have his way with me, he will continually pace back and forth for an hour straight, the entire time yelling "I love you, HELLO, I love you, HELLO, I LOVE YOU"... He's lucky he's still alive at this point...uhg

Anyway, the reason I got them hammocks was because I bought 17" ones, and they're expensive ones but they looked like they would hold up, theres no visible stitching for them to pull at, and it's been over a year with the green cheek's hammock without one problem. I wash his probably once every other week and it's held up. The Quaker likes to poop in his WHILE he's laying down in it... that's the life I guess, must be nice to just poo while you're napping...

While I agree that in most cases having something like a happy hut does not encourage mating behaviors, having a suitable nesting site is one of the important triggers related to mating . I think that lighting and diet are probably the main triggers, but it may well also depend on how many of their triggers are operant at any given time that triggers mating behaviors. I just can't honestly say that when something is known to be related to the mating and raising of their young that it can be classed as absolute in either encouraging or discouraging this type of behavior.

It actually depends on the species, the light schedule and the diet. The species you have, GCC and Quaker, don't get hormonal from having a nest as long as the diet and the light schedule is right -especially Quakers which are the only parrot that use a nest all year round BUT, when it comes to other species (like cockatiels, budgies, lovebirds, etc), you need to be very careful about not providing nests off-season because they are super-duper opportunistic breeders and would go into condition even with short days as long as they have enough protein to eat and a place where to lay their eggs.